This is an entry from one of my early blogs on Grandparents of America Awaken. Address: Billrobertson@squarespace.com.
I started blogging in 2008 because I truly believed my grandkids will be the first generation to have a lower standard of living than their parents. I found almost no one who agreed in 2008.
Soccer Moms and Grandmoms Beware
Wednesday, March 5, 2008 at 08:57PMThere is an old saying in the Middle East. It goes something like this: my grandfather rode a camel, his son, my father drove a Benz, I have my own jet, my son will ride a camel.
Let me give you one example of how this can happen. BP(British Petroleum) a company I have absolutely no respect for whatsoever made a decision to spend $3.5 Billion on their 115 year old Whiting Indiana refinery. They got all the permits, Federal and State. Before they started construction, the Chicago Tribune ran a first page article that BP was going to dump tons of new sludge in Lake Michigan. No one stopped to get any facts. Mayor Daley and Senator Durbin saw the opportunity to grab air time and immediately said they would stop the project. Local groups began to get petitions. Congress held hearings. The project is stopped, maybe forever.
I had dinner one night with a man whose wife was leading one of the groups gathering petitions. I asked him these questions:
1. Do you know there is no sludge involved?
2. Did you know it’s about 2 pounds of incremental mercury per year and that every time it rains in this area 8-12 pounds of mercury go into the lake?
3. Do you know what the project was for? To be able to process Canadian tar sand crude, the most secure form of crude available to us for the future. Plus, if BP takes crude from Canada the pipelines from the gulf coast free up and more product and crude can be shipped to Chicago. Those pipelines run at nearly 100% now.
4. Do you realize this refinery is a blip on BP’s balance sheet and they can choose to close it tomorrow? If that were to happen what do you think the Chicago area will do for gasoline? If would be $10 in a week with lines.
He said, I don’t think my wife stopped to think about any of this, she just wanted to do the right thing for the environment. I want to do the right thing for the environment too. I suggest you stop and think beyond what you hear from the media and the blowhard politicians who put air time in front of judgment. Don’t destroy our future and the future of your family without taking time to get the facts. You won’t get them from the media or elected officials. You might have to dig them out.
Remember, my grandfather rode a horse, my Dad drove a Ford, I had a Corvette and rode on a company jet, my kids drive SUV’s, my grandkids may ride a horse.
Funny thing, Rasmussen did a poll last week. Here are the results:
, July 29, 2012
Hope for the future generation has reached an all-time low. Just 14% of Americans expect today’s children to be better off than their parents. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 65% of American Adults do not expect today’s children to be better off than their parents. Twenty-one percent (21%) are not sure what to expect. (To see survey question wording, click here.)
The national survey of 1,000 Adults nationwide was conducted on July 22-23, 2012 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Fieldwork for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology
If Obama wins in November, we will need to start breeding camels soon.
